By Dan Walsh
Melbourne’s $1.25 million man, Cameron Munster, returns against Parramatta on Friday night.
And, as has been Craig Bellamy’s calling card for more than 20 years, an unheralded winger – who until recently was on just $85,000 a year – will be punching well above his wage outside him.
Grant Anderson is coming off the game of his life opposite marquee Roosters recruit Dom Young, and one hell of a scare when his knee dug into the AAMI Park turf after thoroughly outplaying the English star.
Anderson is good to go against the Eels and joins a long line of bargain buys Bellamy has lifted far beyond what most in the game believed possible.
Prop Josh King, signed from Newcastle and now on around $350,000, utility Tyran Wishart, earning roughly the same, and ex-Tigers back-rower Shawn Blore ($450,000) are all turning heads after the Storm got them for a steal.
Melbourne’s million-dollar stars like Munster, Jahrome Hughes, Harry Grant and Ryan Papenhuyzen have long been complemented by value signings at the lower end of the roster, just as messrs Smith, Slater and Cronk were a generation earlier.
Grant Anderson pulls off a critical try-saving tackle on Dom Young.Credit: Getty Images
Anderson’s 2025 extension – pushing him onto the NRL’s $130,000 minimum wage – was announced earlier this month alongside a four-year deal for rising back-rower Alec MacDonald after both first arrived in Melbourne on $1000-a-week train and trial deals.
“He’s been hanging around on minimum wage for a while, old Ando,” veteran Storm recruitment boss Paul Bunn says.
“He’s been on our development list – which is $85,000 – for a large part of his career before we extended him for next year.
“He’s just such a good team man. He’s mostly played on the wing in the NRL for us but the first time he did, Ando told me his most recent game on the wing was probably five minutes in under-12s. You wouldn’t know it because he’ll just do whatever’s needed.”
Storm stars celebrate a Josh King try in June.Credit: Getty Images
King, meanwhile, is enjoying a cult status after his picture-perfect, banana-bending grubber for an Anderson try against the Roosters that was called back by the Bunker.
He’s long been a Bellamy favourite. And the qualified electrician, who plied his trade in an open-cut mine near his home town of Singleton, has the anonymous iron bar on his mantelpiece to prove it.
At every one of Melbourne’s infamous pre-season boot camps, every player carries their own personal bar around, but only the camp’s hardest worker gets to keep theirs afterwards.
King averaged around 20 minutes off the bench in his last two years at Newcastle, but Bunn still recalls Bellamy telling him, “We need a bloke like that at the club” after a game against Melbourne in 2021.
He’s now seeing an hour of game-time each week as a starting middle after initially joining the Storm with what Bunn describes as “a work ethic and hands like hooves – Kingy’s words, not mine.”
Blore is getting better with every game he plays for the Storm after his off-season Tigers swap with Justin Olam.
He only experienced half a pre-season at the club, but marvelled at the increase in intensity nonetheless. It’s shown in his footy with seven line breaks and a club-high 28 offloads on Melbourne’s left edge.
Wishart meanwhile has filled Munster’s No.6 jumper superbly while the star five-eighth has been sidelined with a groin injury.
Storm officials again aren’t as surprised as the rest of the rugby league world given he’s finally playing his preferred position after NRL starts at fullback, hooker, lock and halfback. MacDonald too has made a fair fist of things as a middle too since being first spotted on the under 20s bench for Wynnum-Manly.
The rise of Bellamy’s cut-price replacements has only one downside for the NRL ladder leaders.
“It’s been difficult at times on who to put in and who we give the chance to,” Bellamy says given the selection options at hand leading into the finals. But as long as that guy that comes in just goes out and does his job the best he can, that’s all we ask for.”
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